


I can picture it after all these days

by sunsetmagnolia, yellingatbabylon



Category: All Time Low (Band)
Genre: Alcohol, Angst and Romance, Break Up, I want to tag this with hopeful ending but that might be misleading, Kitchens are for lovers, M/M, Post-Break Up, Song: All Too Well (Taylor Swift), sad boy hours
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-18
Updated: 2021-02-18
Packaged: 2021-03-13 13:40:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,331
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29527227
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunsetmagnolia/pseuds/sunsetmagnolia, https://archiveofourown.org/users/yellingatbabylon/pseuds/yellingatbabylon
Summary: Something painfully sharp reminds him that this is a memory that’s no longer his. It’s been ruined, like everything else. Before he can stop himself, he tosses the photo into the fire, and then it’s curling to black at the edges as it gets swallowed up by the flames.
Relationships: Jack Barakat/Alex Gaskarth
Comments: 3
Kudos: 9





	I can picture it after all these days

**Author's Note:**

> first and foremost we would like to apologize profusely to [bella](https://clumsyclifford.tumblr.com/)
> 
> we had a big brain moment and couldn't let it go, and continue to share brainwaves to a ridiculous extent

Jack isn’t sure what time it is.

He left his watch at Zack’s place when he slept over on Tuesday (or was it Monday?) and he can see the microwave from his spot on the floor but he never bothered to reset the time after the power went out last. He’d check his phone but then he would be faced with the desperate texts (all left on _delivered_ ) he sent once reaching the halfway point on the bottle of red he found in the pantry. So Jack doesn’t know the time and honestly, he’s not sure he cares anyway.

It’s dark now in his living room and he’s reached the bottom of the bottle and the fire is dwindling some so he reaches forward to gently toss another log into the flames. The fire had been Rian’s suggestion. _It makes the place feel cozy, Jack. You like cozy._ Jack has been operating mostly on autopilot for the better part of three weeks and a break in the routine in the form of a manageable task like building a fire felt like a good change of pace.

Behind him in the kitchen, Jack hears a break in the silence in the form of his phone vibrating against the countertop. He knows he should know better than this by now but he can’t help the way he stumbles to his feet, from the speed at which he stands or the wine, he can’t really tell, and jogs a few steps to reach for the phone.

The notification on the home screen tells him it’s only a text from his mom, another message sending her love and asking if he’s okay and if he needs help with anything or for her to come visit for a while. He hits the lock button to darken the screen before sending any kind of response and drops it to the counter and his face replaces the phone in his hands, his palms pressing against his eyes until he sees stars because damn it, he _needs_ to stop crying at some point. He has to get over feeling like there’s shards of himself breaking apart like he’s a broken glass. As he takes a few deep breaths, his mind trying to keep count as he inhales and exhales like Zack had taught him, he gets an idea. He stands up straight and heads in the direction of his bedroom, for the back of the top drawer in his dresser. For the photos.

Taking pictures with his instant camera had always been Alex’s thing. It was a memory device, he said, but that had never helped Jack understand why he took pictures of the most random things, shook them out and tucked them away in his pocket without showing them to anyone. They went on his dresser, Jack knew, neatly in a row until the dresser was full, and then one row at a time into neat little stacks piled in a box with no label. Alex knew what was in the boxes; he didn’t have to name them.

Jack had swiped a photo from Alex’s hands once, and Alex had just blushed as they waited for the picture to appear faintly and then fill with color. “Smile!” Alex had said out of nowhere the moment they walked through the doors. Between the cold air on his face and the suddenness of the ask, Jack looks a little stunned, and Alex has his arm around his waist, smiling broadly at the camera.

“What was that?” Jack asked as the photo printed. Alex just shrugged like he needed no explanation. That was when Jack had snatched the photo and held it close as it developed. “I look stupid.”

Jack can still hear the sound of Alex’s laugh. “You look cute.”

“No, _you_ look cute. I look like I didn’t know I was getting my picture taken, because I didn’t.” Jack had frowned at the picture, fully endeared by Alex’s sunny smile and, admittedly, how sweet they look together despite him being so obviously unprepared.

“Why don’t you keep that one?” Alex had said unexpectedly. Of course he’d kept it. It felt a lot lighter then than it does now. A lot of things felt lighter then.

Jack looks at the photo in his hands one more time before putting it aside. There are too many photos here to go through each one. He’s almost scared that if he does, he’ll never find it in him to get rid of them no matter how well he knows it’s for the best. Each picture is a bright spot in his memory, but they’re all held close by an ache in his chest that has no hope of going away unless he does _something_ to help it along. There are too many pieces missing now to try and put any of the remaining ones back together.

The rubber band snaps against his fingers as he pulls it off from around the rest of the polaroids. There are only six of them but they feel so much heavier than they should. He thinks distantly back to the phone he left in the kitchen. Would it help to call Rian? He wouldn’t say anything Jack doesn’t already know. He looks at the stack of photos in his hand, fist curled so tightly around them that he can only see the white borders at the corners. He can’t bear to look at them, but he can’t get rid of them until he does.

He knows which one will be next. The first one he’d managed to take of Alex, back when they’d driven upstate with no set destination. They’d ended up at a bed and breakfast for the weekend in some quaint little town that neither of them knew existed, and Alex had been delighted to see there was far less light pollution and far more stars. They’d split a bottle of wine on the balcony after dinner and ended up tangled lazily in bed. He’s sure he said something cheesy about the stars in Alex’s eyes outshining the ones in the sky, and being tipsy was only an excuse. The photo in his hand won’t show any of that though.

Jack picks up the photo he’d set aside first and adds it to the stack. His fingers are already missing the warmth of the fire, and at least there he doesn’t have a reason to sit in the mostly-dark and make himself feel worse, so he closes his drawer and makes his way back to the living room. He pointedly ignores the furniture in favor of sitting on the floor once again, but he grabs a pillow this time.

The fire crackles beside him, sending waves of heat flowing over him and embers floating up into the air. He loosens his grip on the photos just enough to pull the top one. It’s exactly what he expected. Alex almost has his eyes closed, singing along to whatever was playing as he drives with one hand on the wheel and the other in his hair, elbow resting in the open window. The blur of trees in the background are all shades of orange and red, brilliant against the muted blue sky and the grey interior of the car. The other bright spot in the scene is Alex himself. Jack can almost feel the picture come alive as he looks at it, can almost hear Alex singing next to him and encouraging him to sing along too, followed by laughing at him for making up half the words that he can’t remember.

That one day was so long ago that Jack has to wonder how it’s branded itself into his memory, though he finds the answer staring back up at him in his hand. He’d sneakily pulled Alex’s camera out from the back seat, and it wasn’t until Alex heard the click and saw the flash that he noticed what Jack was doing. If Alex had noticed a moment earlier, the photo would have been of his indignant smile and his outstretched arm, grabbing for his camera and yelling at Jack to tell him before he takes a picture.

“But you take candids of me all the time without telling me first!”

“Well we can’t all be as pretty as you without trying.”

Jack still doesn’t know what Alex doesn’t see in himself that is so clear to everyone else. Rian had called it charisma, Jack was a little more romantic in calling it magnetism, but whatever it is that shines through the photo into his dark living room is almost bright enough to dull the fireplace shadows that dance on the walls. If he lets himself feel it, something dark in his chest is pressing against Alex’s smile. Something painfully sharp reminds him that this is a memory that’s no longer his. It’s been ruined, like everything else. Before he can stop himself, he tosses the photo into the fire, and then it’s curling to black at the edges as it gets swallowed up by the flames.

Jack stares into the fire until he’s seeing spots, until the photo is gone entirely. His eyes lift to the dark ceiling of his living room until his vision clears. He ignores the prickling at the corners of his eyes and the way the moment he’s just destroyed is still playing on a loop in his mind.

He takes a deep breath, letting the smell of the fire ground him as he pushes a hand through his hair. It’s getting a little long, he thinks. Alex always liked when his hair was a little longer than usual. He had a habit of twirling the ends of it around his finger whenever they were close enough since Alex tended to get fidgety in the quiet moments.

Jack shakes the thought away as quickly as it appeared and wonders how long it will take before every passing thought doesn’t take him on a path straight to Alex. He picks up the next picture in the stack beside his foot and he squints down at the image as if daring his memory to take him back to the moment held between his fingers.

It’s another one of Alex, another one that Jack took in one of the moments he was able to grab hold of the camera before Alex to snap a candid shot of his boy. A Friday night (Saturday morning, really) if Jack’s remembering correctly and unfortunately, he knows he likely is.

“You’re crazy,” Jack had said through a laugh as his arms instinctively wrapped around Alex’s neck after he had been tugged closer by hands at his waist. It was late, or actually early at that point. Jack had needed to stay late to close that night and fully expected to arrive home to a quiet house. Instead he found a wine drunk Alex dancing in his kitchen to some pop song.

“I just spent six hours grading essays about the Great Depression. It’s the weekend and I want to be happy drunk and dance with my gorgeous boyfriend, damn it,” Alex said while he pressed chardonnay kisses across Jack’s cheeks.

“A brilliant plan,” Jack replied. “Are you going to let go of me long enough to get my own glass though?”

“Nope.” Alex laughed as he pulled Jack in closer at the waist while he dropped his head to rest against his chest as he rocked them back and forth in the middle of the room. Jack had only rolled his eyes and smiled while he shuffled them to the counter so he could pour himself a drink. He had scrunched up his nose at the taste of whatever cheap white Alex must have picked up at the grocery near his school. _(“Alex, I literally own a bar. Let me buy you good wine.” “I have the palate of a college senior, babe. I’m sorry, there’s no changing me.”)_

Jack wasn’t sure how long they stayed like that, rocking back and forth in slow circles with Alex against his chest in a lazy dance while he sipped from his glass. Even as it was happening, Jack knew it was a night with Alex that would always stay with him. Nights like that one were always his favorite, the slower moments. As they shuffled across the tile, Jack couldn’t help but feel like time was standing still, like the moment would never end. Like he never wanted it to.

“Oh, my kids are loving this song right now,” Alex said as the song changed while he grabbed the wine from inside the fridge door. It was while he spun in circles as he pulled the cork from the bottle that Jack reached for the camera sat on the other end of the counter from whenever Alex had last used it during a party or something. The shot he had captured was a blurry one, mid dancing and pouring, a bright blush from the wine (and maybe something more) and a smile painted across his face, his eyes shut in laughter. Jack remembered wanting to picture him like that forever: happy, warm, laughing and dancing in the kitchen they basically shared at that point. Alex was so cemented into his everything by then Jack couldn’t imagine any part of his life or his space without the two of them together in it.

He looks across the room now toward the kitchen and every time he blinks he can see Alex dancing and laughing in the white light from the fridge. He can see the two of them slipping on the tile in their socks at some point and if he keeps his eyes closed for just a moment longer he can see kisses through laughter on the kitchen floor until Jack had pulled them up to keep dancing. He sees Alex on so many other nights sitting on the kitchen counter, his legs swinging while he watched Jack make dinner as he claimed to be _helping_ by stealing something from the pan every so often.

He thinks back to his past self, the version who lived in moments with Alex that felt like they lasted an eternity and how then he wished they would. There’s just a hint of cruelty in the ironic way that now he still feels stuck in those memories and the promise of more like them despite how they were ripped away from him. Jack squeezes his eyes shut for a moment as a laugh rings through his mind and he tosses the picture into the flames.

The fire licks at the last piece of the polaroid. The fire would be burned into his vision by now if it didn’t change its shape so much, but that’s what fires do, they change. _“You can get passionate about just about anything.”_ There was no way for him to have seen the signs, because there were none to see. He can sit here and berate himself for not listening to his intuition, but almost 33 years old and he still can’t tell the difference between intuition and butterflies. _“No, it’s cute. It makes you better at your job probably.”_ Of course he followed the butterflies. _“I’ve never had a crush on a teacher before. Actually, that’s a lie, my high school math teacher was kinda hot.”_ It had earned him a laugh and a smack on the arm from Alex, as it would now.

He can remember the math teacher in question. She was pretty, even in hindsight, but if that was a crush, then whatever he’d felt toward Alex on that first day must have been love at first sight. As much as he tells himself he’s a rational person under it all, he’s also the definition of a hopeless romantic. If it was fate that brought them together, then it was the same cruel fate that tore them apart. If it was luck, then his luck had been on a timer, and exactly three weeks and two days ago, that timer had run out.

He’d woken up to a text he hadn’t dared hope for, and shouldn’t have, because as soon as he read the words he wished he could take it back. The message led him downstairs to his front door, where, as promised, was a small box of mostly trinkets he could just as easily take straight to the trash. Still, some pounding curiosity in his chest made him carry it inside, place it on the coffee table, and dig through it to see just what Alex thought held so much of Jack that he couldn’t keep it in his house for more than 24 hours after a breakup. He was right to think most of it was useless – a cd he’d left in Alex’s car after laughing over how cars don’t have cd players these days, a half-empty pack of gum that could have belonged to anyone but of course it didn’t because Alex had picked up on it being Jack’s favorite within two days, an old polaroid ripped into so many pieces he couldn’t even put it back together to see the image, a receipt that was a little faded but was definitely from Jack’s bar – but he was preoccupied with the one thing that wasn’t there.

Alex had been wearing a bandana the night they’d met, and it had thrown Jack off immediately. Then again, Jack wasn’t supposed to be at the bar that night anyway, but two of his bartenders had called in sick and he was nothing if not understanding. Rian might call him a pushover. Rian might be told to shut up. So it happened that Alex was not a history teacher that night, and Jack was not the owner of the bar, and their chance meeting had given them both slightly different first impressions of each other than what they would have expected later, after they learned each other’s names and drinks of choice and job titles.

It only made sense that after the next few times Alex showed up wearing a bandana, Jack made one too many comments about it and Alex pulled it off his head and put it on Jack’s as he was driving Alex home. After some amount of arguing with Alex over the bandana – drunk Alex could be very stubborn, Jack learned – they agreed that this one would be Jack’s since Alex had so many others. Jack wore it on their next date and left it at Alex’s house, Alex brought it back, that’s how it went. Jack had never planned on the last time he forgot it being the last time he’d ever hold it in his hands.

Thinking about it now, he knows that bandana will show up in one of the photos. He knows exactly which one. He could probably find it by feel, if only because it’s the one he’s looked at the least. All the pictures of Alex, he used to look over often, especially when the polaroids lined his mirror before being tied up and shoved in his dresser. It was more rare that he looked at the one he had of himself. That one, the first one, was always Alex’s favorite of the ones he gave away, and so it had grown to fill a little space in Jack’s heart that felt just short of narcissistic, because it was built by Alex, pinned to the walls of his mind like a little sign that read “this belongs here.”

Jack wants to think if he just keeps his mind off Alex for long enough, he’ll forget all the good things with the same ease he’s found in forgetting all the bad up until the very end. Alex had gotten a little existential on his birthday, but it hadn’t felt like that had anything to do with their relationship. Jack had thought – well, he’d been told – it was because Alex didn’t like the thought of getting older.

“I teach so much of human history, it feels… weird knowing I’m living it. I know that doesn’t make any sense. You know I’ve outlived Joan of Arc? I haven’t led a revolution.”

“You’re educating the youth. Maybe one of _them_ will be the next Joan of Arc.” Apparently this had been the wrong thing to say, because Alex just sighed and frowned, blinking up at the sky.

Jack still doesn’t really understand the allure of stargazing, but Alex’s penchant for searching the night sky for anything identifiable was endearing. Jack still can’t identify a single thing at night aside from the moon and Orion. He thinks back to all the names of constellations Alex had thrown at him and remembers some names: Pleiades, Gemini, the Big and Little Dippers, of which he found the big one once and hasn’t been able to see since despite Alex saying “it’s literally right there.” Alex had shown him a trick for finding the North Star by measuring the sky with his hands like some ancient seafaring pirate, but he can’t remember it now.

Before they’d retreated to the backyard to look up at the stars, they’d been inside with Alex’s parents, celebrating his birthday with far less circumstance than Jack would have expected, though it made sense later.

There was a vase of flowers sitting in the center of the coffee table when they came in, and Jack hadn’t had to ask before Alex’s mom – “please call me Izzy” – informed him that Alex had sent them the week before for her birthday, accompanied by her reaching up to squeeze Alex’s cheeks, making him blush. Alex had warned him that she would pull out the photo albums, not for Jack’s sake as much as it was a tradition for her to coo over how much he’s grown each year. Alex compared it to taking pictures on the first day of school each year, except with his family it was all the time. No occasion was too small. Jack had noted that Alex’s instant camera hobby had a clear source, though he didn’t say so out loud.

At some point, Izzy had left to check on dinner and Jack took the opportunity to grab the nearest photo album. If he had to guess, Alex was around eight in the pictures, ruddy cheeks, same outraged smile at being told how to pose, but with added glasses, bright frames almost too big for his face.

“You never told me you wore glasses.”

“I don’t anymore. I never liked them. I still have those though, somewhere in my room.”

Jack had given Alex one look before Alex groaned and went to get the glasses.

Jack continued to flip through the photo album filled with vignettes of Alex in a previous life, one where he and Jack had never met and wouldn’t yet for another twenty years. His eyes caught on one from a winter much like this, where there was just enough snow on the ground for a young Alex to be dressed like a little marshmallow in his puffy coat, sledding down a hill with his eyes closed, probably laughing, potentially screaming. Before he could get too caught up in the pictures, Alex’s mom came back into the room looking excited.

“Did Alex run off? Do you want to see something? There’s a fox outside!”

Jack wasn’t exactly outdoorsy, but she was so enthusiastic about it he had no choice but to put the photo book aside and follow her to the kitchen where, through the tall glass door, there was a fox. It was barely visible in the lights from the back of the house, but its fluffy orange tail was flicking slowly as it crept along the tree line. Jack glanced to the other side of the yard where there was a small hill that looked perfect for sledding. Izzy was telling him that they see more foxes in the spring, but Jack was thinking of how Alex could drag him out there up that hill with a sled in the dark and Jack would follow blindly. He wasn’t planning on weathering the cold, but if Alex asked…

“Jack?” he heard Alex ask from behind him. “Don’t let my mom corrupt you with her nature agenda.”

Izzy just waved her hands at Alex as he held out the glasses to Jack.

“There’s a fox out there,” Jack said.

“Yeah, because she leaves food out for them.”

“They like cheese,” Izzy chimed in.

“Aww but that’s cute,” Jack said when Alex started to say something about how she can’t adopt them, they’re wild animals.

“Good boy. He’s on my side.” Izzy gave Jack a side hug and went back to working on dinner.

“You can’t encourage her,” Alex’s dad said from his seat at the dining table. It seemed this was an ongoing argument.

Jack glanced at Alex and might have imagined that distant look flash across Alex’s face before he extended his arm again, holding out his old glasses. Jack walked over and took them from Alex, following him back into the living room. As soon as he sat down, he put the glasses on, careful not to pull them so hard they broke around his decidedly adult-sized face, and squinted at Alex. He grabbed the photo album and opened it to the first picture of Alex in the same glasses from years ago, holding it up next to his face. “How do I look?”

Alex laughed and told him to hold that pose, running to grab his camera from where he’d left it just inside the front door. He snapped a picture and told Jack he’d put it in his coat pocket when he put the camera back, but either he lied or made a mistake because it was in Jack’s pocket when he got home later that night, an extra slice of plastic-wrapped cake in hand at Izzy’s insistence. Jack had taken a picture of the polaroid and texted it to Alex with a question mark, and all he’d gotten in return was a smiley face, so he figured it was his to add to his slowly growing collection. It got a spot on his mirror, this adorably mismatched Jack and Alex across decades, a reminder that even though they didn’t know each other back then, they got to know each other now.

Jack looks as closely as he can in the firelight down at the tiny Alex in the picture, almost as unrecognizable to him now as the Alex he’d seen last in real life. He involuntarily sighs in thought as he tosses the photo gently into the fire, watching the colors fade back out before the fire eats it all.

It surprises Jack, the way the next photo he picks up takes him out. Each one has hurt in it’s own right to look at but something about this one has him leaning against the back of the couch, a pain in his chest stinging suddenly like he’s been punched in the ribs. The room is silent apart from the cracking of the fire but if he focuses he can hear the sound of the shutter going off and a gentle laugh ringing out somewhere in the back of his mind.

It’s not the kind of shot that he normally would have any attachment to. It’s a picture of him from the back, his upper half bare after he had tossed his t-shirt somewhere in the direction of the bathroom. He’s holding up a hanger with a red and black flannel shirt. Looking at it now, he knows there’s another one in his other hand but Alex wasn’t able to capture that from his angle sitting on the edge of the bed. They had just stumbled their way through Alex’s apartment after a night out since Alex had insisted Jack stay the night and just borrow something of his to sleep in.

Jack remembers hearing the camera and turning to pout at Alex. He remembers wanting to say something witty and flirty in response to the attempted sneaky picture but they were both so drunk all he could manage was blowing a kiss back. He returned one of the shirts to the closet before grabbing the red one from the hanger and pulling it over his bare arms, not even attempting to bother with the buttons.

He had caught Alex as he was setting the photo beside the rest of them on his dresser, Jack’s arms wrapping around his waist while his head dropped to rest against Alex’s shoulder. His vision swam a bit while he looked at the pictures all neatly laid out, a short story of the two of them being told in little white squares laid across the scratched up wood. Jack hadn’t been given too long to work his way through the tale of them before Alex spun around and pushed Jack onto the mattress and a laugh spilled from his lips while he climbed into Jack’s lap.

Jack had pushed himself up and immediately shivered at the feeling of Alex’s hands dancing up his sides beneath the open shirt before they had come to rest against the top of his chest, Alex’s fingers drumming out a gentle rhythm against his collarbones. Jack had wondered at the time whether or not Alex could feel his heart threatening to beat out of his chest as he looked at him, his bottom lip pulled between his teeth in thought.

“You are thinking way too hard for the state I _know_ we’re both in right now,” Jack had said before reaching a hand up to cup Alex’s cheek and bring their lips together. Alex pulled away far earlier than Jack had deemed appropriate but before he had a chance to whine, Alex had dropped his head to Jack’s shoulder and pressed warm lips against his neck.

“Not to sound possessive or anything but I’m so damn lucky that you’re mine,” Alex whispered with a sigh and a kiss just below Jack’s ear.

Jack felt a blush warm his cheeks as he wrapped an arm around Alex’s waist. “There’s not really a romantic way of saying _ditto_ , is there?” He felt a puff of warm breath against his jaw as Alex laughed in between kisses.

“Maybe _I love you, too_ could do the trick?” Alex said, the slight hesitation in his voice not going unnoticed by Jack as he was met with a worried look when Alex looked up to meet his wide-eyed gaze.

Jack remembered wondering what those three little words would sound like coming from Alex. He didn’t expect that he would be stunned into silence like he was in that moment. A short laugh had left his lips as his thumb traced across the top of Alex’s cheek. “Yeah?”

His question was answered with a tiny nod, Alex’s nerves at the confession still obvious. “If that’s okay? If that’s how you feel, too?”

“Yes,” Jack said without a glimmer of doubt in his voice. “I mean, yeah, I love you, too. But I’m going to wait to say it again until the morning. When we’re both cranky and hungover, if that’s okay?”

“It’s perfect.”

And then Jack was pushed against the mattress again, the flannel shirt soft and warm around him as Alex smiled above him. He could feel the effects of the alcohol starting to wear off as he linked their hands together and pulled Alex down beside him. It was dark, the only light in the bedroom coming from inside the still open closet, but as he held Alex against him, Jack couldn’t help but think that his world had never felt brighter.

The spell breaks suddenly and Jack is back in the darkness of his living room, the soft crackles of the flames just a few feet in front of him and, for just a moment, also the ice maker being the only voices to keep him company. It’s not fair, he doesn’t deserve the ugly hurt pooling in his chest, he thinks, for what feels like the thousandth time in just a few short weeks. Suddenly in his mind dizzied from the wine and love drunk memories, a thought hits him like a bullet between his eyes. He scrambles up, the remaining photos forgotten on the rug as he heads in the direction of his bedroom.

He reaches into his closet nearly blindly, his hands knowing exactly where to reach for what he’s come to retrieve. The red flannel is wrinkled from sitting in a pile shoved behind some jeans since he had tossed it back there a couple weeks earlier. He knew that Rian would have thrown it into the box with the other clothes belonging to Alex he had come to clean out of Jack’s closet in the days just after it happened otherwise.

He balls up the soft, worn fabric while shoving his feet into slippers before making his way back out of the bedroom and down the hall toward the front of the house. He keeps the shirt down at his side knowing there’s a chance Alex’s cologne might still linger on the flannel and given the way the rest of the night has gone, he knows his nostalgia for the soft, sweet scent wouldn’t play nice.

Jack’s not expecting the cold when it hits his bare arms as he steps out into the late winter night but it doesn’t stop his feet from carrying him to the end of the driveway where his trash cans sit waiting for the morning pick-up. One part of his mind had told him to just burn it along with the pictures but his better, barely-there judgement didn’t want to possibly worry Rian and Zack with calls of his living room being set on fire by accident in the middle of the night. He lifts the lid on one of the bins and throws the fabric with some force toward the bottom before immediately turning back to the house. Lingering out in the cold for even a second might bring back more memories of stealing Alex’s sweaters and shirts on chilly nights like this one and he can’t let himself go there.

He jumps at the way the door slams shut from the wind and takes a shaky, deep breath as he lets his back hit the wood of the door while sliding to the floor. He knows what he’s doing in the living room isn’t done yet and that he needs to finish it but whatever he just did has his mind spinning more than the bitter red wine he had drank what feels like ages ago now.

But much like the way every other image he had seen tonight had shot him back to a moment in a so recent past that he thought had held his future, he shouldn’t have been surprised at the way the view from this exact spot knocked him out again while he was already down.

It had been less of a warning sign for him compared to Alex, Jack can think in hindsight, but at the time it hadn’t added up to anything more than nostalgia on top of milestones. If he believes hard enough, he can maybe piece together some kind of sign that he was more into this than Alex was. They’d stood among their friends at the bar and toasted to the new year and maybe if he was more sober he would have been able to tell the difference between distance and intoxication. Maybe he could have picked up that his whispered hope for forever had been received in a more alarming way than he’d intended. And maybe he could have used the next morning to reassure Alex that they didn’t have to move so fast.

The past sits heavy in his mind with missed opportunities and what-ifs, and he can only just bear to think of the most hurtful thing of all. Through the rose-colored glasses and endless nights together, there was no way it could have ended that didn’t shatter him, especially after Alex had been the first to pull away.

If he lets himself hope now, with only his memory to prove him right, he thinks maybe Alex had looked a little hurt by what he’d said even though Jack wasn’t _making_ him say it. He’d regretted buying the flowers right away, but instead of throwing them away, they’d fallen to the floor in the entryway where they sat for almost two days before Zack took them to the trash outside so Jack didn’t have to see them anymore. If he’d missed a couple rose petals, they’re long since dry, but they’re there, a lonely few, hidden behind the back legs of his little console. They must have been blown out into the hall when he slammed the door.

“Let’s be honest, this was fun but it’s not going anywhere.”

“What?” It had felt stupid to ask even then, but Jack could almost feel his world being pulled out from under his feet.

“You and me, we were never meant to last. _Forever_ isn’t a real thing anyway.”

“What are you saying?”

“That this was fun, but it’s not anymore, so we should quit while we’re ahead.” Alex handed the roses back and waited, as if he wanted Jack to have the last word, but Jack had been speechless.

To this moment, he can’t think of what he should have or could have said, since Alex had been so casual about it and anything he could say would have been either spiteful or begging him to change his mind, but it felt like he’d been handed a lost cause and asked to save it. He was helpless, and for the first time, he had nothing left to lean on, no hands left to hold. He’d watched in silence as Alex had walked away perfectly composed as Jack collapsed in on himself from the inside out.

All but one of the pictures is gone, and the fire is starting to die down. He contemplates tossing another log in, but he feels like he should get to bed eventually, even if it’s only for a change of scenery as to which ceiling he’s staring up at. He could sit here in front of the fire until it’s gone out naturally, but it’ll take too long and the last thing he needs is for Rian to drop by in the morning to find him half asleep on the living room floor. Not that Rian would judge him for it, but he would worry, and Jack feels like he’s been responsible for too much of Rian’s worry these days.

Without looking at the last photo, he tucks it into his back pocket. He knows exactly where it belongs, but first, he should reply to at least one text that’s been sitting in his phone all day. His legs protest when he stands up again, but he makes his way to the kitchen where his phone is on the counter exactly where he’d left it. He opens Zack’s invitation to brunch the next morning and replies with a yes, which Zack won’t see until he wakes up at whatever ungodly hour to work out but it will still be before Jack gets out of bed. He immediately sets himself an alarm for an hour before brunch and resolves that he’ll make up the sleep tomorrow. He already knows that Rian will be at brunch too, so more than likely they’ll swing by to pick him up, which means he won’t oversleep on accident.

He looks over at the fire, small and wavering, and then pulls the photo out of his pocket.

Jack is not a bad driver, no matter what anyone else says. Alex had taken him on their first date to get frozen yogurt, so it was only fair that Jack planned the second date. He hadn’t planned on almost getting lost trying to avoid traffic, but there were only so many roads downtown. If he got lost enough he’d end up on a main road and he could lie and say it’s part of the plan.

“Do you know where you’re going? This shortcut is taking a while.”

“Yes I know where we’re going,” Jack had said indignantly. “I’ve lived here longer than you.”

“Well I’m older than you.”

“By less than a year. That doesn’t mean anything.”

“It makes me wiser.”

“Fine, you give me directions. You’re not allowed to look at your phone.”

“I don’t know where we _are_. I don’t recognize any of these streets.”

“I thought you were supposed to be wise.”

Without too much trouble though, they’d ended up where Jack had planned, at a little French bistro that had excellent breadsticks and even better wine. They got a table on the patio and suddenly Jack felt like he understood why Alex kept taking pictures of things. The sun was setting behind Alex and Jack kept blinking against the orange light and wishing he could capture the picture, golden and hazy around the edges like new beginnings. It was only because Alex had left his camera in the car – and he had told Jack as much – that he wasn’t taking a picture of Jack right there.

They’d walked back to the car brushing shoulders until Alex tentatively took Jack’s hand in his, which was all fun until they realized they couldn’t get back in the car that way. Finding their way back was far less of a journey, but Alex had grabbed Jack’s right hand as soon as they were back on the road, and Jack felt like Alex knew what he was doing every time he loosened his grip to play with Jack’s fingers or squeezed his hand as they talked. Jack can’t remember what he was talking about but he remembers Alex kissing the back of his hand, remembers looking over at Alex for half a second too long and hitting the brake a little too hard so he didn’t drive straight through a red light, remembers his heart pounding from a mix of his own bad driving and Alex’s guilty smile, still holding Jack’s hand, tighter than ever.

The photo itself is from the end of that drive, after they’d spent about half an hour talking in the car outside Alex’s house, neither of them wanting the night to end. Jack had poked fun at Alex’s bandana one too many times, so Alex pulled it off his head and tied it around Jack’s. For once, Alex had told Jack to smile before snapping the photo. The photo printed out slowly and they’d chatted some more as it sat on the dash and developed. Alex looked at it and smiled and said it was the best photo he’d ever taken and he wanted Jack to keep it. It lived in Jack’s wallet for months before it ended up in his dresser drawer with all the others.

Jack from last fall stares up at him now, smiling with crinkly eyes and a lopsided bandana and no idea what the future would hold for him. It’s the only photo he had with only him, no traces of Alex except for the fact that he took it. No distant reflections in wardrobe mirrors, no blurry laughs from being too caught up in the moment to take a real pause and pose for a picture. He pockets the photo and his phone and goes back to the fire to make sure it’s out before going to bed. The polaroid is going right up on his mirror, where it hadn’t been before. It hadn’t joined the others until they were all tied up together, never to be looked at again. He pokes around the ashes until all the embers are dull and grey, and turns the kitchen light off on his way to his room, where finally the only lights left are the ones he’s chosen to keep on.

**Author's Note:**

> sorry again to [bella](https://clumsyclifford.tumblr.com/) don't worry we have Plans
> 
> you (and bella) can yell at us on our tumblrs:  
> [meghna](https://reveriesofawriter.tumblr.com/)  
> [sam](https://tirednotflirting.tumblr.com/)


End file.
